Movie :: Avengers Endgame (2019)

Credit:
- IMDB
- Wikipedia

Avengers: Endgame is a 2019 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics superhero team the Avengers, produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. It is the sequel to 2012's The Avengers, 2015's Avengers: Age of Ultron, and 2018's Avengers: Infinity War, and the 22nd film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). It was directed by Anthony and Joe Russo, written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely and features an ensemble cast including Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd, Brie Larson, Karen Gillan, Danai Gurira, Bradley Cooper, and Josh Brolin. In the film, the surviving members of the Avengers and their allies work together to reverse the damage caused by Thanos in Infinity War.

The film was announced in October 2014 as Avengers: Infinity War – Part 2. The Russo brothers came on board to direct in April 2015, and by May, Markus and McFeely signed on to script the film. In July 2016, Marvel removed the title, referring to it simply as Untitled Avengers film. Filming began in August 2017 at Pinewood Atlanta Studios in Fayette County, Georgia, shooting back-to-back with Infinity War, and ended in January 2018. Additional filming took place in the Metro and Downtown Atlanta areas and New York. The official title was revealed in December 2018. With an estimated budget of $356 million, it is the third-most expensive film ever made.

Avengers: Endgame was highly anticipated, and Disney backed the film with extensive marketing campaigns. It premiered in Los Angeles on April 22, 2019, and was theatrically released in the United States on April 26, 2019, in IMAX and 3D. The film received praise for its direction, acting, musical score, visual effects and emotional weight, with critics lauding its culmination of the 22-film story. It also broke numerous box office records and has grossed over $2.6 billion worldwide, surpassing Infinity War's entire theatrical run in just 11 days and becoming the highest-grossing film of 2019 and the highest-grossing superhero film ever, as well as the second-highest-grossing film of all time.

Plot:
Twenty-three days after Thanos used the Infinity Gauntlet to disintegrate half of all life in the universe,[N 1] Carol Danvers rescues Tony Stark and Nebula from deep space and returns them to Earth. They reunite with the remaining Avengers—Bruce Banner, Steve Rogers, Rocket, Thor, Natasha Romanoff, and James Rhodes—and find Thanos on an uninhabited planet. They plan to retake and use the Infinity Stones to reverse the disintegrations, but Thanos reveals he destroyed them to prevent further use. An enraged Thor decapitates Thanos.

Five years later, Scott Lang escapes from the quantum realm.[N 2] He travels to the Avengers compound, where he explains to Romanoff and Rogers that he experienced only five hours while trapped. Theorizing the quantum realm could allow time travel, the three ask Stark to help them retrieve the Stones from the past to reverse Thanos' actions in the present, but Stark refuses to help. After talking with his wife, Pepper Potts, Stark relents and works with Banner, who has since merged his intelligence with the Hulk's strength, and the two successfully build a time machine. Banner warns that changing the past does not affect their present and any changes instead create branched alternate realities. He and Rocket go to the Asgardian refugees' new home in Norway—New Asgard—to recruit Thor, now an overweight alcoholic, despondent over his failure to stop Thanos. In Tokyo, Romanoff recruits Clint Barton, now a ruthless vigilante following the disintegration of his family.

Banner, Lang, Rogers, and Stark travel to New York City in 2012.[N 3] Banner visits the Sanctum Sanctorum and convinces the Ancient One to give him the Time Stone. Rogers successfully retrieves the Mind Stone, but Stark and Lang's attempt to steal the Space Stone goes awry and 2012 Loki manages to escape with it. Rogers and Stark travel to S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters in 1970, where Stark obtains an earlier version of the Space Stone and encounters his father, Howard, in the process, while Rogers steals several Pym Particles from Hank Pym to return to the present. Rocket and Thor travel to Asgard in 2013, extracting the Reality Stone from Jane Foster[N 4] and retrieving Thor's hammer, Mjolnir. Nebula and Rhodes travel to Morag in 2014 and steal the Power Stone before Peter Quill can.[N 5] Rhodes returns to the present with the Power Stone, but Nebula is incapacitated when her cybernetic implants link with those of her past self. Through this connection, 2014 Thanos learns of his future success and the Avengers' attempts to undo it. Thanos captures present-Nebula and sends past-Nebula to the present in the former's place. Barton and Romanoff travel to Vormir, where the Soul Stone's keeper, the Red Skull, reveals it can only be acquired by sacrificing someone they love. Romanoff sacrifices herself, allowing Barton to obtain the Soul Stone.

Reuniting in the present, the Avengers fit the Stones into a Stark-created gauntlet, which Banner uses to resurrect all those whom Thanos disintegrated. Past-Nebula uses the time machine to transport past-Thanos and his warship to the present, where he attacks the Avengers' compound, planning to destroy and then rebuild the universe with the Stones. Nebula convinces past-Gamora to betray Thanos and kills her past self. Stark, Rogers, and Thor fight Thanos but are outmatched. Thanos summons his army to devastate the Earth, but a restored Stephen Strange arrives with other sorcerers, the restored Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy, the armies of Wakanda and Asgard, and the Ravagers to fight Thanos and his army alongside Danvers, who destroys Thanos' warship as she arrives. After overpowering the heroes, Thanos seizes the gauntlet, but Stark steals the Stones back and uses them to disintegrate Thanos and his army, then dies from the energy emitted in the process.

Following Stark's funeral, Thor appoints Valkyrie as the ruler of New Asgard and joins the Guardians of the Galaxy, while Quill plans to search for 2014 Gamora. Rogers returns the Infinity Stones and Mjolnir to their original places in time and remains in the past to live with Peggy Carter. In the present, an elderly Rogers passes on his shield and mantle to Sam Wilson. In the final scene, Rogers gets to dance with Carter in the past, finally loving the life he always wanted.

Movie :: Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (2017)

Credit:
- IMDB
- Wikipedia

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is a 2017 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics superhero team Guardians of the Galaxy, produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. It is the sequel to 2014's Guardians of the Galaxy and the fifteenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The film is written and directed by James Gunn and stars an ensemble cast featuring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Michael Rooker, Karen Gillan, Pom Klementieff, Elizabeth Debicki, Chris Sullivan, Sean Gunn, Sylvester Stallone, and Kurt Russell. In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, the Guardians travel throughout the cosmos as they help Peter Quill learn more about his mysterious parentage.

Plot:
In 2014, Peter Quill, Gamora, Drax, Rocket, and Baby Groot are renowned as the Guardians of the Galaxy. Ayesha, leader of the Sovereign race, has the Guardians protect valuable batteries from an inter-dimensional monster in exchange for Gamora's estranged sister Nebula, who was caught attempting to steal the batteries. After Rocket steals some for himself, the Sovereign attacks the Guardians ship with a fleet of drones. The drones are destroyed by a mysterious figure, but the Guardians crash-land on a nearby planet. The figure reveals himself as Quill's father, Ego. He invites Quill, Gamora, and Drax to his home planet, while Rocket and Groot remain behind to repair the ship and guard Nebula.

Ayesha hires Yondu Udonta and his crew, who have been exiled from the greater Ravager community for child trafficking, to recapture the Guardians. They capture Rocket, but when Yondu hesitates to turn over Quill, whom he raised, his lieutenant Taserface leads a mutiny with help from Nebula. Taserface imprisons Rocket and Yondu aboard Yondu's ship and executes his loyalists while Nebula leaves to track down and kill Gamora, whom she blames for all the torture inflicted on her by their father, Thanos. While imprisoned, Rocket and Yondu bond. Groot and Yondu's loyalist Kraglin free Rocket and Yondu, and they destroy the ship and its crew as they escape, though not before Taserface warns the Sovereign.
Ego, a god-like Celestial that manipulated the matter around its consciousness to form his "home" planet, explains that he projected a humanoid guise to travel the universe and discover a purpose, eventually falling in love with Quill's mother Meredith. Ego hired Yondu to collect the young Quill after Meredith's death, but the boy was never delivered and Ego has been searching for his son ever since. He teaches Quill to manipulate their Celestial power. Nebula arrives at Ego's planet and tries to kill Gamora, but the pair reach an uneasy alliance when they discover caverns filled with skeletal remains. Ego reveals to Quill that in his travels he planted seedlings on thousands of worlds which can terraform them into new extensions of himself, but they can only be activated by the combined power of two Celestials. To that end, he impregnated countless women and hired Yondu to collect the children, but killed them all when they failed to access the Celestial power. Under the influence of Ego's power, Quill helps him activate the seedlings, which begin to consume every world. However, Quill fights back when Ego reveals that he caused Meredith's death due to the distraction she posed.

Mantis, Ego's naive empath servant, grows close to Drax and warns him of Ego's plan. Gamora and Nebula also learn of the plan just as Rocket, Yondu, Groot and Kraglin arrive. The reunited Guardians reach Ego's brain at the planet's core, and fight the Sovereign's arriving drones. Rocket makes a bomb using the stolen batteries, which Groot plants on Ego's brain. Quill battles Ego with his newfound Celestial powers in order to distract him enough to allow the other Guardians and Mantis to escape. The bomb explodes, killing Ego and disintegrating the planet. Yondu sacrifices himself to save Quill, who realizes that the reason Yondu kept him was to spare him from the fate of Ego's other progeny, and that Yondu was Quill's true "daddy". Having reconciled with Gamora, Nebula still chooses to leave and attempt to kill Thanos. The Guardians hold a funeral for Yondu, which is attended by dozens of Ravager ships, acknowledging Yondu's sacrifice and accepting him again as a Ravager.
In a series of mid- and post-credit scenes, Kraglin takes up Yondu's telekinetic arrow and control-fin; Ravager leader Stakar Ogord reunites with his ex-teammates; Groot starts growing back to normal size, exhibiting typical teenage behavior in the process; Ayesha creates a new artificial being with whom she plans to destroy the Guardians, naming him Adam; and a group of uninterested Watchers listen to their informant discussing several experiences on Earth.